District 11 softball: Southern Lehigh win gives Colonial League six in semis

While just Easton, Emmaus and Nazareth are left from the Lehigh Valley Conference after Stroudsburg blanked Liberty on Friday, a whopping six Colonial League teams still remain in the District 11 softball tournament,

That's half the league and remember, three league members had to be eliminated because they were playing another league foe.

That's impressive for the league, which has three of the four teams left in both the 2A and 3A brackets.

Perhaps Schuylkill League members Pine Grove and Pottsville are still the teams to beat in 2A and 3A respectively, but the Colonial League has to feel good about itself.

Southern Lehigh became the last Colonial member to advance to Tuesday's semis.

Here's a little report from the Spartans' win over Northwestern in a game that took two days to complete:

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A change in day didn’t change the scoreboard for the Southern Lehigh and Northwestern softball teams.

On Thursday, the District 11 Class 3A quarterfinal in Center Valley was delayed, and eventually suspended, due to bad weather conditions.

When they left off in the fourth inning, the Spartans led 7-4.When they resumed on Friday neither side could score, leaving Southern Lehigh with a 7-4 victory and a date in Tuesday’s 3A semis.

The third-seeded Spartans (15-7) will play No. 2 seed Pottsville (16-5) at a time and site (likely Parkland or Pates Park) to be selected.

Northwestern finished 11-10.

Katie Tankred tamed the Tigers with a four-hitter that included five strikeouts and just one walk. All four Northwestern runs were unearned.

The Spartans offense was sparked by catcher Shelby Wilson who was 3-for-3 with three runs scored and a two-run double in a four-run fourth.

Jen Hallowell added two hits and knocked in three runs for the winners.

“We have been hitting the ball very well and Tankred does a good job to keep us in the game,” said Solehi coach Brian Neefe. “It’s just a matter of us playing solid defense. Everybody has good and bad days, but if we’re ‘on’ there’s nobody in our district class that we can’t beat.”